– on our road trip through Iowa we stopped in at this impressive collection of motorcycles. Here is a selection of engines spanning 7 decades. More to follow this week!
October 20, 2020
Essex
“Call me Ishmael”
On this day 200 years ago the whaling ship Essex was attacked and sunk by a sperm whale in the middle of the South Pacific. This maritime story gave Herman Melville the idea for his classic novel Moby Dick. This 1928 Brought Superior SS100, also named Moby Dick recently sold for over £500,000. The name was given after Motor Cycling magazine tested it in 1931 and declared it “the fastest privately-owned machine in the world”.
July 6, 2020
Ride on boyo!
– Welsh singer actor Lee Evans promoting a thirties vibe in sheepskin lined belted leather coat, tall engineer boots, and over the shoulder napsack. The Vincent Comet is a suitable motorcycle prop for the magazine shoot. The vintage backdrop adds a perfect foil.
June 22, 2020
Time
Picked up this great reference book of Triumph motorcycles from the last eighty odd years. All models and variations discussed in depth from the legendary Meriden examples to the current Hinckley offerings. Lots of photos and masses of written information.
The Complete Book of Classic and Modern Triumph Motorcycles 1937-Today https://www.amazon.com/dp/0760366012/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_EIw8EbMGGRAH3
April 30, 2020
Africa or Bust…
A pair of intrepid adventurers with their Triumph combination somewhere in Alkebulan (Mother of Mankind) during a 1932 trip across the continent. It’s Frank Flood and Jim C. Wilson who rode from the Nigerian cost to The Red Sea. The original dual sport travelers. Short sleeves and pith helmets.
March 13, 2020
On Ilkley Moor
March 5, 2020
K5054
On this day in 1936 Vickers test pilot ‘Mutt’ Summers took the RJ Mitchell designed prototype up for an eight minute test flight at Eastleigh Aerodrome. A legend was born.
February 28, 2020
Graveyard Shift
Friday night was typically late night horror films on my 6” B&W TV. Under the bed sheets with a mono headphone I’d watch such classics as Dracula or the Wolfman. here our Friday lady on a bobbed classic Triumph in a graveyard… in monochrome.
December 15, 2019
The Sons of the Desert
Stan and Ollie | A comedy duo from the golden age of Hollywood who got up to many japes and shenanigans. Their comedy was thoughtful idiocy and usually a ‘fine mess’ was ‘gotten into’.
August 3, 2019
Pure Design
Usonian | On our weeklong trip around Wisconsin we have visited a number of Frank Lloyd Wright buildings. Today we stopped by the Herbert Jacobs house which was built in 1937. A very early version of his ‘everyman’ Usonian home its carport was complete with a classic 60’s Swedish sports-tourer Volvo P1800. The red car works superbly with the red brick and Cherokee red paving.
May 7, 2019
Aureola
Bumblebee | My parents are enjoying a cruise around the Baltic this week. Their first port of call is the wonderful wonderful Danish city of Copenhagen. They sent this photo of the distinctive Nimbus motorcycle on display at a museum. The nimble and reliable in-line four 750cc engined workhorse became a staple mode of transportation for the Viking population. The Type C was introduced in 1934, when this model is from, and continued in very much this form until 1959. Its nickname was Humblebien (Bumblebee) due to a buzzing exhaust note.
April 22, 2019
The Earth Roared
Earth Day | What better way to go out there and explore what our planet has to offer and see how beautifully fragile our home rally is than on the back of a Tiger. For nearly a Century there have been sharp clawed Moto’s roaming the globe looking for earthly adventure.
April 20, 2019
Gesamtkunstwerk
bauhaus 100 | 2019 is the centenary of the formation of the influential German design school based in Weimar and later Dessau. As well as founder Walter Gropius and later directors Hannes Meyer and Mies Van der Rohe there were numerous staff and students who were allowed to develop creative talent in the manufacturing arts – .Gesamtkunstwerk (Total work of Art ). Here’s one such alumni Heinrich Brocksieper, who worked on photography, painting and animation, enjoying great German motorrad engineering of the day in front of the workshop block at the Dessau building.
“Heinrich Brocksieper auf seinem Motorrad vor dem Bauhaus Dessau, 1930, Originalfoto 64 x 41 cm © Nachlass Brocksieper, Hagen.”
March 29, 2019
European Efforts
ISDT | Motorcycle Racer extraordinaire Marjorie Cottle was a Force for women riders in the first half of the 20th Century. Here she is flying through a pre-war Austria in 1939 on a Triumph attempting to earn a gold medal in the arduous International Six Day Trials.
History notes:
Despite the worsening political situation in Europe the German organisers went ahead with the event, which saw 61 British competitors make the start. Marjorie Cottle, riding a 250 Triumph, formed part of the Sunbeam ‘A’ club team, the other members being Geoff Godber-Ford (350 Sunbeam) and A A Sanders (350 Triumph). The trial commenced as scheduled on Monday 21st August with a run into recently occupied Czechoslovakia but within a few days the British competitors were becoming increasingly concerned. On Friday 25th the recall telegram arrived from the War Office in London and the remaining British contingent, including Marjorie Cottle, was escorted to neutral Switzerland and safety. Britain and Germany were at war nine days later.
December 29, 2018
The Sunday Post best
The Broons – every year growing up we’d have either an Oor Willie annual in our Christmas stocking or a Broons one. Beautifully pen & brush ink work by Dudley D. Watkins for DC Thompson they epitomized the straightforward Scottish character of the Twentieth Century.
Maw & Paw Broon with their eight children: Hen, Daphne, Joe, Maggie, Horace, the Twins and The Bairn. And Gran’paw too.
This is a great spread of the parents trying to get away for a peaceful weekend only to be overrun by their offspring and friends.
As they would declare: “Jings, Crivvens an’ help m’Boab!”
In the upper right Maggie rides in with one of her beaus (aplenty) .
